WorldNetDaily drooled at the prospect of what might be in the special announcement Donald Trump made on Oct. 24. It devoted an article prior to his announcement by repeating an unsubstantiated story that “Michelle and Barack Obama once seriously considered getting a divorce,” followed by Trump’s claim that “none of the speculation about the subject of the announcement was correct.”
Well, Trump’s big announcement turned out to be a self-promoting dud — he vowed to donate $5 million to the charity of President Obama’s choice if Obama would release his college transcripts.
But WND still needed to pretend like Trump’s offer was anything but a fizzle. So Bob Unruh penned an article headlined “Kaboom! Trump drops Obama bombshell” that avoids mentioning Trump’s actual proposal anywhere in the headline or the subhead and was mostly a updated cut-and-paste of the earlier article.
Meanwhile, Newsmax — which has promoted Trump’s presidential ambitions and tried to partner with him to host a Republican presidential debate — played the same game of make-believe. An Oct. 24 article by Martin Gould treated Trump’s dud with gravitas, even adding, “The Obama campaign had no immediate comment on Trump’s video.”
Meanwhile, outside the right-wing, Trump-fluffing fever swamp, his announcement was treated with the lack of seriousness and outright ridicule it deserved.